


i'm warmer in the winter with you

by Hannah (hannahoftheinternet)



Category: Phandom/The Fantastic Foursome (YouTube RPF)
Genre: Christmas, Family, Fluff, Holidays, M/M, Presents
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-25
Updated: 2017-12-25
Packaged: 2019-02-20 07:49:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,310
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13142232
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hannahoftheinternet/pseuds/Hannah
Summary: In which Phil gets Dan a present for Christmas and keeps him in suspense.





	i'm warmer in the winter with you

**Author's Note:**

> This is my longest fanfiction ever holy cow  
> Big huge mega thank you to Nour @sexylegsrats for being the worlds best beta! :D

“Is that a new jacket?” Phil poked his head into Dan’s room, winding his long, purple scarf around his neck. 

“You noticed!” Dan’s face lit up as he pulled at the breast of his light blue coat. Hearing Phil’s giggle fill the room made him blush as bright as the fairy lights they had put up across their rooms.

“I'm very observant,” Phil admitted. “Since when have you been interested in wearing pea coats?”

Dan dramatically pressed a hand to his chest and feigned a half-swoon. “The rebrand has left me a changed man. Are you ready?”

“I left my gloves in here last week,” explained Phil, pointing at the soft black accessories. “Remember?”

“Oh yeah,” Dan said, smiling fondly at the man standing in front of him. “That was fun.” He admitted, recalling that tranquil night that was spent idly cuddling on his bed, watching Studio Ghibli movies and drinking cocoa. He summoned up Phil’s benign laughter that had filled the room, mostly from the strokes of Dan’s lips against his.  They ended up that night, falling asleep in each other’s arms with  _ My Neighbor Totoro  _ still playing in the background.

Dan smiled to himself while taking the fingerless gloves off his bedside table, tossing them playfully at Phil. The other man pulled them on to cover his pale, slender fingers by the soft material.

“I forgot how much I liked those,” confessed Dan. He crossed the room in a few graceful steps. He was in stark contrast with Phil in yet another way, he mused. Dan’s fingers closed around his.

“Let’s go,” Phil whispered. “We’re going to be late.”

Dan gave a short, soft chuckle. “We can’t be late, Phil,” he reassured. “We're not on schedule. We have all day.”

“I’d still like to get going,” he protested. Dan shook his head, dotingly smirking at him and taking his own red scarf off the hook and wrapping it neatly around his neck.

“You’re blotchy again,” noted Phil. “It’s not all my fault, either.”

Dan dismissed the comment. “Stop worrying.”

Dan had let go of his hand, so Phil reclaimed it, intertwining their fingers. “Good to go?” They were both already wearing jackets, scarves, and gloves, but Phil stopped in his own bedroom for something just before leaving.

“You’ll see when I come out!” he promised Dan, who was staring skeptically at him. “You’ll like it.”

“You're not going to wear that hat, are you?” Dan asked, false concern filling his features. “I hate that goddamn hat.”

“It’s not the hat. Just be patient! Close your eyes.”

Phil snagged his new glasses off his dresser. He hadn't showed them to Dan yet; he'd only gotten them the day before, but he liked them and he hoped that Dan would too.

He reopened the door. Dan was covering his face with his hands. “Can I open them now?” he said, that mocking whine that Phil half-loved, half-hated touching his voice. 

Phil put on the glasses. “Yeah.” 

Dan slowly lowered his hands and began to grin. “Are these new? They're… really nice.”

“Thanks,” Phil said. “I just got them yesterday.”

“You look like a nerd,” complimented Dan. (It was a compliment, whether he'd meant it that way or not.)

“thanks.”

They left the house hand in hand. Phil’s bare fingers were chilly in the cold December air, but that didn’t matter because he had a warm coat and a warm Dan next him. He put one hand in the pocket of the long, light brown jacket he loved and wiggled his fingers against Dan’s hand. Dan gripped his hand tighter. 

London was beautiful in the weeks before Christmas. Jingly music played, shoppers milled about, and the chatter of a thousand voices mixed in the air. 

“What first, Man With a Plan?” Dan asked, staring around at the range of shops that surrounded them. “Christmas gifts?”

“Food,” Phil said, leading Dan over to a café crammed between a toy store and an Athleta. The sign over the door read  _ Bean There Café _ . “I came here with Louise a few weeks ago. Their hazelnut lattes are amazing.”

“Thinking with your stomach.” Dan laughed. “Alright, sounds good.”

They sat in a dimly lit corner. Soft, instrumental Christmas music played through a radio on the counter. Phil had, of course, ordered the hazelnut latte, along with a chocolate croissant. Dan opted for a white chocolate drink with whipped cream and a cinnamon bun. 

“So, what were you doing with Louise?” Dan asked, sipping his hot chocolate. “You two working on a collab?”

“Actually,” said Phil as he dusted croissant crumbs off his hands. “I needed to ask her something.”

“Oh?”

“About you.”

“Oh!” Dan looked startled. “That’s new. What was the question?”

His reaction made Phil smiled slyly. “You’ll have to wait a week and six days to find out.”

Dan counted on his fingers. “That’s… Christmas. Phil, did you get me a special Christmas gift?”

“Maybe.” Phil sipped his latte, smirking a little. 

“Phil.” Dan gave him an incredulous look. “I told you not to get me anything special.”

“It’s our first Christmas… together. It’s important.”

Dan sighed, smiling from behind his mug. “You’re precious, you know that?”

“So I’ve been told.”

Dan pestered Phil though the outing. “What did you get me?” he asked for the fourth time as they were leaving Forbidden Planet. 

“I’m not giving in this time,” Phil said stiffly, but the stolid facade slipped and he started giggling. “Anyway, it’s funny to have leverage over you.”

The two lived in an atmosphere of feigned conflict for the next twelve days. It was a sort of game, one that Phil enjoyed immensely. 

“Hey, Dan!” Phil called from the sofa, three days before Christmas Day. “Could you get me some Ribena from the fridge?”

“Only if you tell me what you got me!” yelled Dan. Phil huffed and put his laptop to the side, rising out of his comfortable place. The kitchen door was open and Dan was digging through the fridge. “Where’s the cream cheese?” he asked, head still in the refrigerator. 

“You ate it for breakfast,” reminded Phil. “Move out of the way; I want Ribena.”

He gently pushed Dan out of the way but this didn’t keep Dan from coming again closer to Phil and resting his head against Phil’s. Dan took hold of Phil’s face and brought their mouths together. Dan’s lips were cold from the air of the fridge and he nipped gently at Phil’s bottom lip. Phil knocked him gently with a shoulder and he fell back, separating their lips.

“Nice try,” Phil said, taking a bottle of Ribena and setting it on the counter. “Wait like a normal person.”

Dan pouted, but Phil could see that he liked the game. “I hate you,” said the other man, leaning back against the counter. 

“No, you don’t,” Phil said. He’d been provided with many opportunities to be snarky over the last few weeks, and he found that he quite enjoyed the quick remarks. That was Dan rubbing off on him, he supposed. 

Dan huffed a tiny laugh. “Alright, I don't. What do I have to do to get you to tell me what you got?”

Phil paused in the midst of opening his Ribena. It was rare that Dan gave in to offering favors. Phil could only remember one other time he’d done it, and the memory still brought a faint blush to his cheeks. As it did then. 

Dan knew that recalling that event made him blush, and he let out a silly little giggle. “You’re thinking about that other time. I’d be willing to do that again, if you like.” He winked in a cocky fashion and that gesture  _ almost  _ made Phil crack. But he stood his ground. 

“There is something you can do,” he said, emphasizing the  _ something.  _ Dan’s face grew hopeful and a little mischievous, but the smile slipped away when Phil finished his thought. “Wait.”

Dan groaned and stalked away, presumably to watch anime in his bedroom. Phil laughed to himself. But a little worm of doubt gnawed at his chest. Worry almost made the game hard to keep up. It was a dumb idea, Phil knew, but it had seemed so right. Maybe Dan would see the humor in it. 

The next morning, they were leaving. That was the plan: they would go their respective ways and spend time with their families until Christmas Day, when they would come back home and enjoy the day in each others’ company.

Phil’s train left earlier than Dan’s, but Dan didn't seem to want to let him go. He pressed kisses all over Phil’s mouth and blocked the door at the same time.

Phil laughed. “It’s just two days, Dan. You’ll survive.”

Pouting, Dan stepped away from the door. “I know,” he said. “Have fun.”

“Bye,” whispered Phil, opening the door and departing. 

He worried a fidget toy between his fingers as the train rattled through England. He hated being away from his house, his home. 

He knocked on the door of his family’s house. The door flew open and his mum hugged him tightly. 

“Hello, Mum,” he said. 

She held him at arm’s length, as she’s been doing for over ten years. “You look different. And it’s not the jumper. Come in, I’ve put the kettle on. There’s still a good while before everyone else arrives, and you can tell me what’s changed.”

In a moment, he sat at the old kitchen table, gripping a steaming mug of English Breakfast. His mum settled herself in her favorite place at the table. “Has something happened?”

Phil set his mug down on the table, choosing to override the worry curled in his stomach. “I have a boyfriend,” he said, before he could stop himself. He held her gaze. 

She didn't look surprised, thankfully. “Dan?” she asked, sipping her own tea. 

Phil nodded, his hands growing almost unbearably warm. They were still resting on the sides of the mug. 

“Are you happy?” his mum queried. She didn't look upset or angry, to her credit. Kindness was in her character.  

Phil bobbed his head in agreement again.

She smiled at him, reaching across the table and ruffling his hair like he was twelve years old. “That’s that, then.”

The days following were amazing. Christmas dinner, which Phil had unsuccessfully tried to help with, tasted fantastic. His family were more bearable than normal, Dan texted him incessantly, and his gifts were some of the best he’d ever been given. When it came time for him to leave (it came all too soon and not soon enough), his mother gave him some very good advice:

“Don't let that man go, Philip Lester.”

The train ride back home was blurry. The announcement of his stop came through fuzzy ears. He wasn't at all used to waking up at four in the morning and travelling.

He slept in the taxi, too. It was only when the driver shook him awake outside his house that he woke more than half-way. A mumbled thanks escaped his mouth and his feet drew him up the stairs, and the door opened under his key almost before he was aware of it. 

The fireplace was cold. Dan had not arrived. The pile of presents under the tree was exactly the same as how they had left it. 

Phil threw himself onto the sofa and slept some more. 

He was awoken, rather rudely, by the sound of someone falling over the shoe rack by the front door. Loud cursing followed this, and then a call for “Phil?”

Phil flung himself off the couch. Dan was picking himself up off the foyer, obviously not expecting to be assaulted by Phil. Which he should have been. 

Phil pressed a kiss on Dan’s mouth, the perfect  _ welcome home _ . 

“Hi,” said Dan. “Merry Christmas.”

The sun was bright over London and, sitting by the window with Dan at his side (as it should be), Phil suddenly noticed that it had snowed while he was gone. 

“Presents?” Dan asked, his cocoa mustache making Phil giggle. 

He took a present, addressed to himself, out from under the tree and seized one for Dan as well. 

“Can I open it?” Dan more whined than said. 

“Last,” said Phil, ripping the paper that bound the neatly wrapped package. 

The pair traded off the job of unwrapping. Christmas carols played in the background and the fire they had started together blazed, filling the room with heat and a bright orange glow. 

Finally,  _ finally _ , when the pile of presents around them was almost too deep to navigate, Phil dropped the last gift on Dan’s lap. 

He opened it gingerly, one taped-up seam at a time. There were no rips as he pulled his present out of the mass of wrapping paper. He was silent as he looked at it, turning it over in his hands as if expecting something more. 

“Is it okay?”

Dan looked at him, a smile turning the corners of his mouth. 

“It’s amazing.” He turned the thumb drive over in his hands. 

Phil rested his head on Dan’s shoulder. They fit together so well, he noticed again. “I’m glad.”

“What’s on it?”

“Pictures.”

“But why? We have thousands of pictures.”

Phil brought him in for a kiss, pressing their lips together in the way that had become so familiar to him. He tasted the remnants of the cocoa of Dan’s lips, smiled as Dan put his warm hands on Phil’s sides. “These ones are just for us.”

Dan giggled sweetly, and the sound made Phil grin even wider. “Okay.”

Phil put an arm around Dan’s shoulder and rested his head in the crook of Dan’s neck. Dan's breathing, the warmth pooling in his stomach, the quiet jingle of the bells from whatever carol was playing. Phil felt he could stay there forever.

**Author's Note:**

> Find me on Tumblr @fullofregretshowell and be sure to check out my profile for more phanfiction! Love y'all!


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